South Hills rallies for three runs in seventh to upset defending Boras Classic champion Huntington Beach
Two days after Easter, coach Benji Medure stood near the dugout holding a basket with some goodies. He was in no mood to give some away, not after his Huntington Beach High baseball team gave away Tuesday’s game late.
Huntington Beach’s 2-0 lead in the bottom of the seventh inning did not hold up.
The magic number for the Oilers to extend their 13-game winning streak was three, as in getting the final three outs. Instead, three runs are what they gave up in the last inning to West Covina South Hills in the opening round of the Boras Classic South bracket.
The Huskies won in walk-off fashion, beating reigning tournament champion Huntington Beach 3-2 at Mater Dei High.
With the bases loaded and one out, Brandon Dieter drove in two runs with a single to left-center field. An error in the outfield allowed the Huskies to clear the bases and knock off Huntington Beach (13-3), the No. 2-ranked team in California by CalHiSports.com.
“We tightened up at the end. We definitely did,” said Medure, whose team lost for the first time since dropping a doubleheader at San Jose Bellarmine Prep on Feb. 24. “We showed our youth right there. The pressure of this tournament got to us at the end. We got to treat it as a learning experience.”
The seventh inning ruined the Oilers’ chances of making a second straight run at the Boras Classic state tournament title. To the surprise of many, the Oilers will face the top-ranked team in the state in Sherman Oaks Notre Dame (11-1) in the loser’s bracket, not the winner’s bracket, at JSerra on Wednesday at 9 a.m. Notre Dame lost 2-0 to No. 7 Etiwanda on Tuesday.
Edward Pelc, making his debut for Huntington Beach, threw five strong innings. The left-hander struck out six while allowing three hits and two walks.
Medure said Pelc, a junior committed to the University of San Diego, sat out the first 30 days of the season because he transferred from Sage Hill to Huntington Beach. Pelc and reliever Jordan Vance, who pitched the sixth, blanked South Hills.
With a two-run lead, Medure handed the ball over to his closer, Nick Morlett, to start the seventh. The lefty had been reliable all year.
But South Hills is no stranger to rallying late. The day before, the Huskies scored twice in the top of the 10th inning to defeat Covina Charter Oak 2-0 in extra innings.
The bottom of the order gave the Huskies (10-2) a chance to come back against Huntington Beach.
Michael Ortega started things. He led off the seventh with a single toward right-center field, where center fielder Jake Vogel was unable to come up with a diving catch. Then Artie Ramirez and Nick Lugo, hitting eighth and ninth, respectively, came through with singles to load the bases.
Up next was Dieter, who also started on the mound, striking out four, giving up two earned runs on five hits in six innings. Dieter was the same batter who hit Pelc the hardest, leading off the first with a triple over Vogel’s head in deep center.
Dieter, a Stanford-bound senior, didn’t hit the ball as hard in the seventh, but it was enough for left fielder Nick Upstill to misplay the ball on the synthetic turf field. By the time Dieter reached second on the error, Lugo was motoring home to win it for South Hills.
“To play the No. [2] team in the state … and one of top teams in the country, and to pull off a win like that is huge,” said Dieter, who went two for four.
Dieter and the Huskies fell behind in the second inning. Jag Burden’s double scored Pelc, and Burden tried to make it a two-run lead. He raced home on Vogel’s single to left, but Ortega threw Burden out at home plate to end the inning.
Vogel, who was three for three, got onboard in the fifth inning on a walk, one of Dieter’s four during the morning. Vogel stole second base with two outs, and on the next pitch, Dylan Ramirez brought him in to put Huntington Beach up 2-0.
“I felt like we had the game in hand,” Medure said. “[They] were coming up with the bottom of the lineup [in the seventh]. We definitely didn’t want to see Dieter come up. We had a feeling something bad was going to happen.”
Dieter got his shot. Three of South Hills’ first four batters reached safely to load the bases in the seventh, setting the stage for Dieter.
The game changed after Dieter hit a 1-0 changeup. The Huskies waved the first two runners home, then a third after the error, and they poured onto the field to celebrate a dramatic win.
We showed our youth right there. The pressure of this tournament got to us at the end. We got to treat it as a learning experience.
— Huntington Beach coach Benji Medure
After getting up early to leave South Hills at 6:30 a.m. for a 9 a.m. game, the Huskies finally woke up. They get to play Etiwanda (8-1) in the quarterfinals on Wednesday.
“The nice thing is now we get to play at 3 [p.m.],” South Hills coach Darren Murphy said with a smile. “As loud as the cheer was that we won, I think they were just equally as happy about getting to sleep in tomorrow.”
Get more of David Carrillo Peñaloza’s work and follow him on Twitter @ByDCP
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